Travellers were left stranded in airports, sitting on the tarmac or crammed into departure lounges as snow caused havoc at airports on Sunday and Monday. 

Stansted and Gatwick airports were both forced to close runways on Sunday due to the bad weather, with scores of flights affected at airports across the country into Monday.

James Brookbank’s three children aged 8, 7 and 3 made the floor of Brussels Airport their bed for the night after their flight from Helsinki to Stansted was diverted following an initial four-hour delay.

Mr Brookbank told Sky News: “We’re obviously not as good as they are in Finland with snow.”

Drivers stuck in freezing cars for hours – follow UK weather latest

He said they landed in Brussels around 3am to “nobody from Ryanair, no vouchers, no communication”.

“[We were] just fending for ourselves really, children, people of all ages strewn across the floor.”

Thirteen hours after they were supposed to leave Helsinki, he said they were queuing for a flight to Stansted but did not know when it would take off.

“It’s shocking,” he said.

“Kids having to sleep on the floor, disgraceful doesn’t cover it.”

Gemma Craggs said she was “shocked at how much we were left to fend for ourselves”, when her Emirates flight from Gatwick to Dubai was cancelled on Sunday night.

The Londoner was supposed to be flying to Mauritius for her honeymoon – a trip already pushed back after COVID delayed her wedding for two years.

She said she “fully appreciates the snow situation” but said communication from the airline had been “incredibly poor”.

They were only told the flight had been cancelled three hours after the scheduled take-off time of 8.20pm, she said, by which point the shops were shut so they couldn’t get food, trains had stopped running and all the airport hotels were booked up.

They had to go back through passport control and find their suitcases among all the luggage from flights cancelled on Sunday before getting an Uber back home, ready to try again for the same flight on Monday.

There were massive queues, including “people with tiny children that were just crying” and she said she didn’t know what people who did not live nearby would do, as there was nothing provided for them.

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Sussex man Derek Hills ended up forking out £300 for a taxi after his easyJet flight from Milan to Gatwick was diverted to Bristol. He said after almost three hours at the airport, the “hundreds of frustrated passengers” were “told to make our own way home and reclaim the money”.

He said: “I’m fortunate to have a job that allows me to be able to do that, many others didn’t.”

Mr Hills offered seats to two other people, including one member of cabin crew from another airline who was “visibly shaken and said she was ‘scared’ as she had no means to get to Gatwick”.

He added: “I finally got home at 4.30am this morning, £300 lighter, extremely tired and now facing a long day working.”

A spokesman for easyJet said: “We did everything possible to minimise the disruption for our customers and were advised they will be reimbursed for their onward travel and any other expenses they may have incurred including accommodation and meals.

“The safety and wellbeing of our customers and crew is easyJet’s highest priority and while this is outside of our control, we would like to apologise to customers for the inconvenience caused as a result of the weather.”

Ryanair and Emirates have been contacted for comment.

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